The solar heater problem 2 : how much power can we expect to collect ?
• use Stefan-Boltzmann’s law to calculate the power emitted by the Sun
• use the geometrical factor for two disks to calculate the power reaching the Earth, the solar constant
• as a side result, solve the Donald Trump problem at zeroth order : show that with a completely transparent atmosphere, it would be difficult to play golf on Earth
• determine the power collected on a 10m2 solar heater
Diameter of the Sun: 1,4 106 km
Surface temperature of the Sun : 5800 K Distance to the Sun: 1,5 108 km
Diameter of the Earth: 12700 km
Effective albedo of the Earth: 0.3
power emitted by the Sun per unit area : σT4= 64 MW/m2 total power on a disk of radius Rs = σT4 π Rs2 = 9.6 1025 W